


Once in a Thousand Lifetimes

by CatsShadow



Category: Amar a Muerte (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-20
Updated: 2019-03-29
Packaged: 2019-11-26 03:10:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18175073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CatsShadow/pseuds/CatsShadow
Summary: Soulmates contain the greatest power in the universe, but only the rarest of soul mate pairs can fulfill the prophecy and save us all.





	1. The Cards

**Author's Note:**

> M for later chapters. 
> 
> Welcome to the moving of great forces...

Dearest Sister Fate, 

The spirts tell me you are interacting with the mortals as "Barbara" now. I've never understood your need for the corporeal form on this plane. Mortals are entertaining, but withough respite they are exhausting.

The cards were right sister - you fortold the emergence of soulmates and I have found them. 

They are a rare pair unlike any I have witnessed across the ages. Sister, their power is... I almost dare not say, but the prophesy may be upon us. 

A great evil has already emerged around one of the pair; we must intervene to intwine their fates. If we miss our chance we could wait another 1000 generations. 

Prepare Sister. I act on the next new moon.

Eternally,

Muerte


	2. Run

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beginnings 
> 
> Darkness and light
> 
> An answered call
> 
> Like knows like
> 
> First brave step
> 
> Enough
> 
> Warrior angel

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger Warning -  
> Description of physical abuse after the "......"

Juliana shoulder wrenched back as she hit something... hard. A lifetime of dancing kept her on her feet as she spun wildly and threw out her hands to catch herself against the alley wall. 

 

She didn't know how long she'd been running, but her burning legs and unfamiliar surroundings indicated she'd been gone a while. Shaking her head, she tried to control her breathing. 

 

As her body calmed, Juliana's mind started processing what had triggered her headlong sprint into the hidden alleys of Mexico City. 

 

Her eyes closed as cradled her face in her hands... they took her... what was she going to do?

 

................... 

 

Juliana spent her childhood looking over her shoulder. Her father's violence and her mother's resolve to weather his abuse twisted them into an endless cycle of cruelty and pain. Juliana loved her mother. Lupe's spine was made of steel and Juliana knew she loved and protected her in all the ways she could. 

 

Hard as she tried, it wasn't enough. 

 

Juliana was nine the first time she stepped in front of El Chino's fist. Everytime it happened she would wake up to her mother gently dressing her wounds with silent tears tracing down her cheeks murmuring quiet reprimands for putting herself in danger. Juliana couldn't remember how many times that happened, but she couldn't stop the overwhelming instinct to protect the people she loved. 

 

Friends were too hard. 

 

Most didn't understand her reality, and trying to justify it was out of the question. She didn't want their pity and knew deep down they couldn't offer the help she needed. Those that did understand only knew because they had their own burdens to bear, and if Juliana tried protecting others, who would protect her mama? It had always been her and Lupe against the world. 

 

Mexico City was amazing. For the first time in her life Juliana felt the glimmer of hope that she and Lupe could build a life. Her father was gone, Pancito had given them a place to stay, and yes, they were hungry but she'd been through much worse that unwittingly she dropped her guard the tiniest bit.

 

A voice imbued with devastating sadness drew Juliana's gaze from the sun dappled sidewalk to a girl who simultaneously captured and broke her heart. She was breathtakingly beautiful and infinitely fragile. Juls mind reeled as a man who appeared to be someone to the affected angel wheeled on her and began shouting. To her surprise, the angel held her ground and shouted back. Juls felt a strange sense of solidarity and pride at the glimpse of the angel's fighting spirit. Juliana knew too well the strength it took to avoid being a victim. A warrior recognizes her like.

 

Juls feet felt rooted to the ground. As the angel walked away, it felt like her heart went with her. 

 

As fate would have it, Juliana's angel had a name, Valentina. From her park bench vantage, Juliana felt the unchecked depth of Valentina's pain. Juliana needed to act, do something, anything... so she did the only thing she could think of... she made a joke... a terrible one... Val's face transformed from sad to afraid to then a flabbergasted wet joy as she realized the joke and surrendered to the laugh bubbling past her lips. 

 

Juliana's heart lept at the sound and the tiniest rays of hope started trickling past her defences. 

 

As she walked away, her cheeks hurt from smiling so much. 

 

..................

 

Juliana's thoughts fought through the pain and the panic. 

 

Enough. 

Running isn't the answer. Juls heaved a heavy breath and straightened her back.

 

Even from the grave El Chino's ghost was smearing its evil across her life. But she hadn't survived this long to give up at the first spark of happiness in her life. Lupe was coming home. 

 

Alone, she would lose... Juliana needed help. She needed an angel.

 

She punched the number into her phone and her voice broke over her name... "Val... mi mama..." 

 

The kidnapping narcos and El Chino's rotting soul didn't know the sleeping warrior they awoke in Juliana Valdez or the avenging angel she had guarding her back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!


	3. Ripples

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Did you feel it too?
> 
> We may be too late...

Barbara sensed the great moth beating her wings before the veil shimmered and she gently fluttered down alighting on top of the moody christal ball centered in the table before her.

 

A faithful friend to her sister death, Barbara acknowledged the great moth with a slight bow of her head. The moth, never one to bother with pleasantries, snapped her wings back sending up a delicate plume of dust that quickly coalesced into the enchanted message she carried. 

 

Dearest Sister,

Did you feel it? 

I write you from the furthest edge of the spirit plane. I know the timing is dangerous, but he felt it too. I sense him gathering strength. 

We need it. 

She is waking, but her other still slumbers. 

Take care dear sister. The moon is near. 

Eternally,

Muerte

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading.


	4. Beacon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lost.
> 
> Hope. 
> 
> Buzzzzzz.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bienvenidos a la ciudad de Mexico

A lonely figure huddled in front of a roaring fire place as rain drummed ceaselessly on the veranda's pitched metal roof. Sheets of water obscured the world around her, cocooning her away with her thoughts. 

 

Valentina's mind wandered as her cloudy gaze fixed on the curved metal in her hands. Cool and familiar to her touch, the gleaming surface distorted her reflection, stretching her visage into a broken abstract painted in the stolen palette of her features. 

 

It was heavy. Teeming with the soothing numb that would slowly percolate her senses. The seemingly innocent cap, so easy to twist free, the almost non-existent barrier to swallowing through the burning down her throat and the soon dampening of her feelings and the lifting of her spirits. 

 

Valentina felt things deeply, often too much... Pain, her most reliable companion, defined her almost as far back as she could remember. 

 

Escaping the pain was part of her routine. She had to, and Mezcal was the most reliable vehicle to that end.

In the beginning, it was different. Golden tinged memories of a joyous family, her family, danced at the dawn of her memory. A woman with curtains of cascading, honey brown, hair and a smile as brilliant as the sun radiated warmth at the center of the Carvajal universe. These memories were rare and treasured heirlooms of an innocence lost. Like the ribbons of vanishing smoke from the spent candles on her 5th birthday cake, the memories of her extraordinary mother started to fade until they ceased completely. With her departure the Carvajal family crumbled. The vacuum of her presence stole her fathers patience, her sister's kindness, her brother's mirth, and Valentina ... it took her light. The moment her mother left, her soul was shrouded in shadow. 

 

As Valentina grew friends, family, and even strangers remarked at the uncanny resemblance appearing in her features. It was hard to miss someone and feel guilty about resenting the unrelenting judgment of living up to the inflated legacy of a beloved ghost. The constant comparisons made it hard to know herself in relationship to the mythology of her mother's light. She felt as though the world expected something she could never be, and the shadows around her soul deepened. In the midst of their own grief, her family couldn't help her, so they sent her away. An unorthodox upbringing in boarding schools in foreign lands gave Valentina experiences and languages far beyond any of her childhood contemporaries. But for all her skills and travels, she had yet to find a pastime or place that brought her peace. The shadows of her mother's loss reached deep into her soul and grew with every missing hug, kind word, and unshared moment with the family she had left. 

 

The ethereal beauty of the Carvajal children and the magnitude of their wealth made them prized prey for the so-called journalists and predatory photographers who sought to splash their photos and salacious headlines across their papers. The public was enamored with the breathtaking drama of their tragedy playing out against the glittering backdrop of the unfathomable opulence of their wealth. This constant invasion and reinvention of their pain fed the public's fascination with the Carvajal family and reopened their wounds every time they started to knit. The family could not heal together, so they grew calloused and apart. 

 

Valentina pined for her family. As her final year of boarding school approached, she focused all her attention on being accepted to a university in Mexico City. She got in. 

 

And now... she was here. In her family home; an exotic bird in a gilded cage. Feeling even more lost and alone than the first night in the frozen wilds of her Canadian boarding school. 

 

Unbeckoned, her fingers traced the textured circumference of the cap and started to grip. A clock in the hall quietly chimed, halting her movements; the fading sound bringing her out of her reverie. Ten, ten chimes... 10:00AM. She couldn't remember the last time she noticed it was 10AM. Drawing in a deep breath, Valentina did the unthinkable. She relaxed her fingers, and slipped the flask back into her purse. Her eyes fluttered closed and she focused her mind on the one thing holding her together. She had met someone. Connected with someone. A girl who she never should have met, but for the dark haired stranger's bravery and kindness. As their hands came together on that park bench and Valentina's name slipped past her lips, she found herself feeling a foreign, but not unwelcome flicker of warmth around her heart. 

 

Juliana. 

 

Valentina couldn't help the slight quirk of her lip as her mind wandered to the quirky, raven-haired beauty who had rocked the foundations of her universe. 

 

Juls with her humility, humor, and easy-going calm. 

Juls with her gentle touches and smile that reached her eyes.

Juls with her restraint and her defenses around strangers. 

Juls with her work ethic, honesty, and unbreakable spirit.

Juls saw Valentina, and wanted to know her. 

Juls wasn't frightened by her pain; she acknowledged it and for some unknown reason moved toward it. 

Juls was light.

 

For the first time since her mother's death, a balm was soothing the unchecked pain constricting around her heart and it was not from a bottle. 

 

Valentina's was already addicted to the feeling of easy breathing, to laughing, connecting to another soul, to caring about someone else. 

 

Val looked through the falling rain and sighed. She was terrified. 

 

"Val... mi mama."

"Where are you? I'm coming."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ♡ what do you think of our angel? ♡

**Author's Note:**

> To be continued?


End file.
